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by amandajbruce
Summary: In which Oliver attempts to apologize for being an idiot. A missing moment from "The Wheel Near My Bed Keeps On Turning."


**A/N: I wanted to do a missing moment giving Oliver a chance to apologize for running out on Lilly in "The Wheel Near My Bed" episode. That's really the only time we get to see him in the whole show, when he makes the mistake of thinking Miley wants him to marry Lilly for her to stay, so we never get to see how long it takes for him to get back on Lilly's good side. I'm betting not long though seeing as how Lilly never stays mad at him for any real length of time. So, set between the Stewarts telling Lilly she can live with them and her actually moving in. Enjoy.**

***

"_It's gonna take a whole lot more than flowers..."_

How could he be so thoughtless? That's what she really wanted to know. She was sorely tempted to call him and ask him.

Except that she wasn't sure if she was talking to him or not right now.

Angrily, she threw another pair of shoes into a box. She had to have those too. There were just too many different occasions where she had to have the right pair of shoes. Damn Miley and her influence. If she and Miley had never become friends in middle school, Lilly probably could have lived her whole life and never owned this many pairs of shoes. It was Miley's fault that she couldn't go into a department store without at least taking a trip through the women's shoes, probably trying on a couple before she made herself leave.

No, she wasn't supposed to be mad at Miley. Miley was the one offering to let her move in with her family. Miley was the one who had actually found a solution to her staying in Malibu. It was Oliver she was mad at. Her supposed boyfriend. Her boyfriend who apparently "had his whole life ahead of him."

Ugh. How could he say that? Was she not going to be included in this long life that was looming on the horizon? Was there something so wrong with her that the thought of being with her for the rest of it was just too unappealing?

She could understand how Miley's mention of a solution for them to still be together had his mind jumping to marriage. He was on his knees in front of her after all. And his hand was holding onto one of hers pleading with her to stay, telling her he loved her. She just didn't understand his sudden need to run away when his brain decided to make that leap. He couldn't get away from her fast enough. She had glared at him and let him see just how angry she was, but she hadn't let him see how much he hurt her by being ready to run out the door. She hadn't let him see that behind the glare she was trying to keep tears from gathering at the corners of her eyes.

Of course, Miley had distracted her right away, so there was never any real danger of her crying right then.

The pile of shoes in front of her diminished as her thoughts whirled, but the collection in the box steadily increased. This packing thing was much harder than she anticipated. She'd never had to move before, at least not that she remembered. She'd never had to split all of her belongings in two before either. Well, maybe not exactly in two, but she was sending a lot of stuff with her mom. And she'd never had to focus on uprooting her home life while wondering just why her boyfriend was so afraid to be with her. She gave up, picked up the entire pile of boots she had been intent on downsizing and shoved them all into the box. If Oliver was going to act this way, at least she would still have cute footwear.

Lilly moved on to her desk from the closet she had just attempted to tear apart. There were still dozens of outfits hanging up, but she didn't think she could handle trying to go through her wardrobe anymore right now. Clearly, that wasn't working. She knew she couldn't bring as much with her as she wanted to, but it seemed like everything was important. She quickly tucked her laptop into its case, making sure all of the proper cords and cables were in there as well, then opened a drawer and set to work going through a pile of papers she had been holding onto for, well, she didn't really know what. Dozens of pages of notes from classes she wasn't even taking anymore filled her line of sight, and she shoved them into a garbage bag, trying not to read the words scrawled in the margins by the hand of an Oken.

He was just so, so, stupid. Argh.

A few pieces of paper were torn to shreds as a way to vent some of her feelings, but that wasn't enough. Downsizing. She was supposed to be downsizing. Spotting Oliver's favorite of her lip glosses sitting next to her lamp, she tossed it in the trash as well. That was one way to cut the amount of her belongings in half. The tube was almost empty anyway. She followed it up with a mix CD and the birthday card he had given her last year. She didn't need them. Of course, less than thirty seconds later, she spied the giant "Ollypop" standing proudly in one corner of her room, complete with a printed version of her boyfriend's face, and she dug all three of those items back out of her garbage bag, letting them sit on the desk, staring at her just like the eyes on the Ollypop.

She got up, marched over to the giant sweet on a stick and turned it roughly around so the eyes would be looking at the wall. It didn't make her feel much better, but she nodded her head as though it did, before settling back into her chair.

There was a picture of the two of them stuck in the edge of her bulletin board, one from when they were about thirteen, before they'd ever admitted how they really felt about each other, and the sight of it made her chest ache. Everything had been simpler then, hadn't it? No, not really. One of them had probably wanted more even then. Ripping the photo from its spot, she prepared to tear it in half, finger tips gripping the edges of the paper, but she couldn't do it. Instead, Lilly slumped down in her desk chair, the photograph on the wooden surface in front of her, and sighed loudly.

Who was she kidding? She wasn't angry anymore. Just frustrated with him. And still a little hurt. He had left to get her "flowers" hours ago, and she had been in her room packing almost the entire time since. Miley was supposed to be rearranging her belongings to make some space, but Lilly suspected she would probably be doing most of that when she actually hauled all of her stuff over there.

There was a soft creaking of the floorboard in her doorway, but she didn't turn around. There were two options here. Either her mom stopped packing up the kitchen long enough to make her way upstairs and check on her, which wasn't likely, or her "flowers" had arrived. She was betting on the latter. Shoving the picture aside, Lilly cleared her throat and began to methodically test all the pens held in the coffee cup at the edge of the desk on a scrap of paper. She should make sure they all worked before she decided whether to pack them or not.

There was a soft click, which she took to mean the door had been shut. Yeah, she was pretty sure of just who it was now. Her mom wouldn't have felt the need to shut the door. Unless it was a burglar or something... but would a burglar have taken the time to sneak all the way up to her room and then close the door behind himself? Well, hopefully not. If he did, she probably had bigger problems to worry about than someone trying to steal her vast array of shoes.

Another creak sounded behind her, indicating the person at her door was now completely in the room, just passing the small table near the front. It was going to be harder to tell where he was until he reached the next squeaky spot by the end of her bed.

Which would then put him almost directly behind her.

She swiped the tip of a blue pen along the paper. A dark line of ink followed the tip and she placed the cap back on, setting the pen to the side. As she picked up a green pen from the cup, she cocked her head slightly, honing her hearing in on the area behind her without actually turning to look. There was a slight shuffle against the fabric of the carpet. He was closer.

She cleared her throat again, determined to ignore him, but knowing it wasn't going to happen, not really. She uncapped the pen, attempted to draw a line on the paper, and saw no stripe of ink trailing the tip this time. Giving the pen a little shake, she tried again. Nothing.

Another shuffle, the rustling of his jeans as his leg brushed up against her bedspread.

She licked the tip of one finger, running the pen over the moisture on her skin, then tried to make another mark on the page. No line appeared. Capping the pen, the muscles in her back tensed when she heard the creak. She tried to relax her shoulders and tossed the pen into the garbage bag that had been steadily filling with random junk before she had sat down.

"Are you still mad at me?" was the whisper that came from somewhere just over her shoulder.

Lilly froze, but didn't say a word. She had almost expected him to stay silent, to wait for her to call him out for trying to sneak up on her.

"Lils?"

She sighed, testing a purple pen now. Uncap. Swipe. Recap. Toss. "I'm not mad." Her voice was just as low as his.

"Are you sure? Cause I wasn't thinking. I didn't mean-"

"Just forget it, Oliver." Lilly had meant the phrase to sound offhand, like she was over it, but her words came out sharper than she intended, her voice wavering a little bit on his name. Uncap. Swipe. Recap. Set aside. Her eyes started to burn.

"Lilly, I _am_ sorry, you know. I was stupid and-"

"It's fine." If she wasn't careful, her voice was going to take on the higher, whinier pitch it had when she cried.

She didn't hear him, but she felt him take another step forward. The heat from his body was on the other side of the chair. So close. She could imagine what it would be like to just stand up and dive into his arms like she did every other time they had made up after a fight. Except that he wasn't intent on always having his arms ready to hold her, was he? Closing her eyes, she let her grip tighten around another pen, but she didn't do anything but hold on to it.

"I didn't bring you flowers." The voice was still low, but she was right, it was so much nearer to her than before and her eyes popped open at the ragged quality to it. "I thought this would be better."

As he finished the sentence, an arm shot out above her right shoulder to reveal a pint of ice cream. Lilly hesitated for a second, then let go of the pen, reaching up to take it from him. She didn't open it though, just set it down on the surface of her desk where the other Oliver-related items had accumulated and stared at it. His arm slowly moved back, but then his hand was on her shoulder, his finger tips ghosting over the cotton of her tee shirt and she bolted from the chair, shaking his hand off.

Not wanting him to see the water that threatened to spill from her eyes, Lilly walked the short distance to her window and looked out, her gaze landing on his house, and she realized for the first time that even though she was getting to stay in Malibu, nothing was going to stay the same. She wouldn't be able to just cross the yard to see the boy next door anymore. There would be no more sneaking into one another's houses at night. No more just showing up at the crack of dawn to go surfing. She swallowed uncertainly. She had lived in this house almost her entire life, and she was just going to leave it. Just like that. No warning.

"Lillypop? Will you please look at me?" Desperation tinged his voice now. Oliver knew he messed up. He never intended to say what he did at Miley's. He had just freaked. That was all. He had hoped that by the time he got over here, Lilly would have cooled off. She had glared when he ran out of Miley's, but she hadn't actually looked that angry, and now, well, now, she didn't look angry either. More disappointed.

Bracing her hands on the sill, she turned her head, just slightly, just enough for him to see her profile, to see the sadness lining her features.

"I'm so sorry." He took a step closer. "I don't know why I – look, I'll do anything you want me to do to make it up to you. What do you want me to do? You need help packing?" He gestured to the sea of boxes and belongings that littered the room. The only surfaces not covered were the desk chair and the bed. And only because Lilly had been using those. "Or do you really want me to go back out and get you flowers? Cause I will! I just thought – Ice cream always makes you feel better, you know?" He paused, but Lilly made no response. "Just tell me what to do." His eyes were pleading with her as much as his voice was.

She didn't answer. Instead, she said, "Can I ask you something?" The words left her mouth without thought. She hadn't really wanted to ask the question, but she _needed _to know the answer almost more than she had ever needed anything else, definitely more than flowers or ice cream.

"Whatever you want," he hurriedly agreed, moving forward another step.

Lilly twisted her body to the side, sliding her bare feet along the carpet and leaning her hip against the window sill now, almost fully facing him.

"Do you ever wonder," she started, then cleared her throat, almost embarrassed to bring this up when the idea had so clearly unnerved him. His eyes were wide when she shot her gaze over to him and she tried again. "Do you ever wonder what it would be like?" She was sure she didn't have to specify what "it" was considering the last time they spoke was obviously at the forefront of his mind as well.

"You mean, do I wonder what it would be like if we?"

"Yeah." She nodded her head, chewing on her lower lip as their eyes locked again.

"All the time," he admitted ruefully.

"But," her eyebrows knitted together in confusion and she could feel her tears drying before they even came close to falling this time, "then why did you-"

Oliver cut her off with a groan and his own question. "If I asked you to marry me right now while we're still in high school and still figuring things out, would you honestly not freak out?"

She didn't say a word, but her cheeks warmed and a breath caught in her throat as the thought crossed her mind that he was right. She would have freaked out too. Especially since her current idea of teen weddings brought up images of Jake and Tracy in a Vegas chapel, and her and Miley racing to stop them. Yeah, she got the point. Again, she gave a short nod.

Oliver sighed, relieved that she understood, but he didn't make another move to get close to her yet. He wasn't sure if she was okay, if she would even let him closer to her. Instead, he backed up and sat down on the edge of her bed, watching her, one hand wrapping around the pink and purple bed post at his side.

"What's it like?" Her voice was nearly inaudible.

"What's what like?"

"Us. Together." She gave him an encouraging smile before she looked away, chewing on the inside of her cheek.

"You really wanna know?" The corners of his mouth were starting to turn up as well.

"I really wanna know."

"Well," Oliver started, "we're definitely not in high school anymore."

Lilly turned completely around with a wry smile, sitting on the edge of the windowsill, mirroring his position on her bed.

"And I'm finished with the whole rock star life having done a few sold out tours and a couple of hit singles. And I'm a successful record producer."

"A producer? Really?" Lilly laughed a little bit. She wasn't surprised he had been a rock star in his future fantasy, but she was surprised he was helping other people make music.

"What? You don't think I could do it?" He relaxed a fraction, leaning back to stare at her ceiling, shaking a few strands of his newly black hair out of his eyes.

She pushed herself away from the sill and took a couple of steps toward him, answering, "actually, I think you'd be pretty good at that... what about me?"

"Obviously you're everyone's favorite teacher. Sometimes I think you might end up being a guidance counselor though. You know, the good kind, the kind that actually helps students." He took his gaze away from the paint overhead and found that Lilly had edged even closer to him.

"Anything else?" she goaded, eyebrows raised, still standing just out of reach.

Oliver leaned forward, elbows on his knees and added, "I think we have three kids, but I haven't picked out their names yet." He grinned.

"Three? Don't you think that's a little much?" She tried to be stern, but she found it adorable that he had thought about the future even this much. It was more than she had expected after his reaction earlier.

"Yeah, three's a nice, round number."

"Three is not a round number. That's what people say about ten," she shot back, shaking her head.

"Ten? Lilly, I don't know if I could handle ten," he teased.

"Very funny," she said flatly before giving him another smile.

"What about you?" Oliver asked, reaching for her hand.

She let him pull her a little bit closer to him, her knees bumping gently against his. "Pretty much the same thing, but you know, I only saw one kid." She shrugged, scraping one finger nail along a strip of purple on the bed post. "Guess we can't agree on everything." Oliver laughed appreciatively, and his other hand moved to her waist. "You know what's funny though," she continued, "I always pictured this house. I mean, I know that we don't really spend a lot of time here, but I always saw our house like this one."

Oliver nodded in agreement before saying, "yeah, it's gonna be weird not having you right next door anymore." He got a wistful expression on his face as he informed her, "when you forget to close your curtains, I can see right in your room."

"Yeah, that works both ways, Oken. It's a shame you always sleep with clothes on," she joked before adding, "On the plus side, you don't have to worry about me breaking my neck when I climb down the side of the house anymore." She let go of his hand to place both of her own on his shoulders.

"True... but it's probably going to be harder for you to sneak out at the Stewart's." He moved his free hand to the other side of her waist now, letting his fingers trail up and down her sides.

"Hmm... but Miley does have that handy rope ladder," Lilly reminded him with a smirk, moving her right knee to brace herself against the mattress.

"That is a very good point," he murmured as her head leaned down closer to his, her hair surrounding his face and the movements of his hands stilling. "But, I think we should definitely make the most of the last few nights in your house before we think about rope ladders."

One of Lilly's eyebrows quirked and she had to ask, "what makes you so sure I'm not still a little mad at you?" But she was still leaning closer to him, her forehead almost touching his.

"Because you love me?" He said with a hopeful smile. His fingertips tightened their grip on her hips, one of them hooking into the waistband of her jeans, and he added, "and because you aren't still on the other side of the room," before pulling her down onto the bed with him.

Lilly giggled as he rolled her underneath him before sighing and telling him, "I guess I can forgive you this time."

"Good," he whispered, his lips hovering just above hers, "cause I hate when you're mad at me."

She let him kiss her to prove just how not mad she was, one of her hands reaching to the back of his neck, trying to hold him closer as she curled a leg around his. The hand he wasn't bracing his weight on found its way back to her waist, finger tips edging under the hem of her tee shirt and she squirmed slightly under his touch before arching her back off the bed. The palm of his hand climbed further up her rib cage and she deepened the kiss. When he had to pull his head away for air a few minutes later, Lilly fell fully back to the bed and admitted, "I've got to say, fighting with you now definitely has its advantages. You never would have made up with me like this when we were fourteen."

"Well," Oliver told her cheekily, "I would have tried if I thought you wouldn't punch me."

She grinned again as Oliver's mouth moved to her jawline. "I don't know," she breathed, letting her eyes fall shut. "I probably wouldn't have punched you."

"Yeah right," he said into her skin. He left a trail of open mouthed kisses from just below her earlobe down to her collar bone, and she impatiently tugged on his shirt to bring his lips back to hers.

As Oliver kissed her, she let her hands move back down his chest, then up under his shirt to feel his skin. It was his turn to squirm now. She took advantage of his distraction, maneuvering them so she was on top, only to have him roll just a little too far on her bed, and the stack of books on her nightstand crash to the floor as his shoulder hit them. She laughed at the confusion on his face, but then sat straight up, straddling his thighs when she heard footsteps on the stairs.

"Lilly," Oliver hissed, "get off of me."

"What are you afraid of?" She asked, arms crossed over her chest now. He might have been telling her to get off of him, but his hands were still wrapped around her waist, against the bare skin where her shirt had ridden up, holding her in place, not pushing her away, so she knew he didn't really want her to move. Though she knew she only had about thirty more seconds before she would need to be not touching him if that noise on the steps was her mom.

"You don't want to move to Atlanta, right?" Oliver asked, his eyes wide. "Cause if your mom sees us like this, she's going to make you go with her."

Lilly gave him a mock eye roll and a quick kiss before easing off his legs and climbing to her feet, tugging her shirt down to its usual position.

"Lilly, you didn't throw Oliver out the window or anything, did you? He said he was coming over to apologize," came her mother's muffled voice as she reached the top of the stairs.

He scrambled off the bed and over to the desk while Lilly bent down to retrieve the books, avoiding his I-told-you-so look. "No, mom, I just knocked over some books."

The bedroom door opened as Lilly stood with a few of the aforementioned books clutched in her hands. Her hair was a little tousled and Oliver was surreptitiously trying to wipe her lip gloss from his mouth. Both of them kept their gaze averted from the rumpled sheets and one another. Heather Truscott eyed the two of them suspiciously.

"Why is your door closed?"

"I was trying to figure out how I'm going to get that mirror off the back of the door. I think Dad super glued it there or something. Maybe I'll just leave it for whoever buys the house." She kept her voice neutral as she replaced the books, but her heart was pounding in her chest and she was itching for her mom to go back to the kitchen. She could still feel Oliver's hands on her skin, and that feeling didn't go well with her mother's lecturing.

"Okay, well, be careful up here, alright?" Heather pushed the door completely open before she turned to head back downstairs.

"Will do," Lilly called after her, waiting until her mom was more than half way down the stairs before shutting the door softly again. Her apology ice cream sat forgotten on the desk until she had to clean up the melted sticky mess a couple of hours later.

***


End file.
